I went with the Sigma EF500 DG Super from Cameta auctions on eBay, for $160. They ship internationally too.

How is the Sigma flash working out for you? I had terrible experiences with mine as chronicled here: http://www.stevesforums.com/forums/v...mp;forum_id=84. After two flashes and an adjustment by Sigma I gave up and returned it for a refund. I tried my friend's 3600 and it works perfectly. So, now I am looking for a good deal on the 5600 and I'll have to buy the bullet and cough up the bucks. Meanwhile I am using a Sunpak 433D on a hotshoe adapter. The auto thyristor does a MUCH better job than the Sigma's TTL metering did. I basically found that the Sigma is not compatible with the 5D and alwaysfires at the same power.

Looks like the prices have come up on the 5600 in the last couple of months since this was first posted. I now have a hard time finding it anywhere for under $350.

I paid $295 from Digital Foto on 4/5, and the next week they were out of stock and the price jumped to $348. I too returned a Sigma, and have been in email contact with a guy who got his Sigma the same day from Cameta, but took them up on their offer to have Sigma re-do it. I was afraid to take the chance, and didn't want to wait that long, so I took their gracious refund offer and went with the 5600. No regrets here.

Seems like 5D and 7D owners have been buying the 5600 HS flashes up in droves. Everybody is either sold out or asking for close to or over $400 now. I think I'll stick with my Sunpak for now and just dial in the aperture and ISO. Its auto exposure works quite well. Soon, there will probably be either a) a new supply of 5600's at reasonable prices, b) a new (hopefully affordable) model customized for digital, or c) a low cost 3rd party flash that is truly compatible (unlike the Sigma EF-500 DG Super). I don't want to get the 3600. It's a lot less powerful (although still quite a bright beast) and cannot be swiveled in vertical mode.

My girlfriend might kill me if she finds out I posted these shots since she did not get herself made up, but I wanted to do a quick comparison between my Sunpak 433D and the Minolta 3600 flash I am borrowing from a friend.

This one was taken with the Sunpak with the proper ISO and aperture dialed in.

This one with the Minolta 3600 in P mode. I prefer the Sunpak. The 3600 underexposes a little bit. Just takes a few steps extra to get the Sunpak ready, but it's worth saving several hundreds of bucks. The good old Auto Thyristor exposure control still does a fine job. And the Sunpak is more powerful than the 3600 and almost as strong as the 5600. The remote function would be nice, but not worth over $400 to me.

I just got a Sunpak 433D and already have a 3600HS. I haven't been satisfied with the 3600HS because of inconsistent exposures. I usually have to use a -1 flash compensation to avoid overexposure but I am always having to finesse good exposures using flash and exposure compensations. I have had some lazy problems also so it will be interesting to see if I still have that problem. My dog is a master at doing "lazy eye" so I have a great subject to test it with.

I have a question about the Sunpak 433D.What is the best modeto use on the5D? I would assume Aperture priority and selecting an aperture that matches the 433D setting and the same for the ISO setting. Are there other modes that you can use on the 5D when using this flash?

Go manual exposure exposure versus aperture priority. If you try to use Av mode, the camera will leave the shutter open long enough to expose for ambient light (which can result in motion blur from subject movement).

I'd use manual exposure, setting the aperture and ISO speed to match the flash for the aperture range you use (for example, ISO 200 and f/5.6).

Then, set the shutter speed on the camera to something that's fast enough to prevent too much ambient light exposure (for example 1/100 second), unless you want to allow more ambient light into the image (then go slower with a shutter speed).

Go manual exposure exposure versus aperture priority. If you try to use Av mode, the camera will leave the shutter open long enough to expose for ambient light (which can result in motion blur from subject movement).

I'd use manual exposure, setting the aperture and ISO speed to match the flash for the aperture range you use (for example, ISO 200 and f/5.6).

Then, set the shutter speed on the camera to something that's fast enough to prevent too much ambient light exposure (for example 1/100 second), unless you want to allow more ambient light into the image (then go slower with a shutter speed).

Correct, you need to set the shutter speed, too. The camera does not "sense" the flash on the adapter and exposes as though it does not exist, unless you choose "manual". The only other choice rather than using the flash's automatic flash control, is to set the switch on the flash to manual at which setting it always fires at full power. In that case you'd have to always calculate the correct camera setting based on subject distance. That's a pain though. For example, since the GN is, I think, 165 at ISO 100, you'd have to set the aperture at 10 if the the subject is 16.5 ft away, at 8 if it's about 20 ft away, at 2.0 if it's 80 ft. away, etc. This of course changes by 1 f-stop with every doubling or halving of ISO value. Gets a little complicated for snapshots, don't you think? I learned that stuff 25 years ago with my fully manual Eastern German Praktica SLR. I am glad that Auto Thyristor flashes have come along to help take the math out of taking a picture. And I think they still do a great job to evaluate and control flash power.

I didn't realize that the 5D doesn't automatically set the shutter speed to 1/125 or 1/160 when using the 433D flash.

Since you have to manually set the shutter speed, at what shutter speed does it start affecting the exposure in a negative way? I see that 1/100 is being used, what abouthigher shutterspeeds? Is this the poor man's HSS?